AlwaysRiding: The (not so) Winter Hack Bike.

Tracing the evolution of the 'winter hack bike' leads to the door of Dominic Mason, founder of Mason Cycles and early Kinesis designer. Here Dominic recounts his early days designing what would become the new standard for off-season steel:.

"I think I had a little hand in changing the concept of the 'winter hack' when I designed the first 'Racelight T' bikes for Kinesis. At that point you were supposed to suffer on an awful, heavy, dull, steel hack through winter and sling all your shredded old components at it...So I did the Racelight Tk out of some decent tubing and people started putting Ultegra on it........I called them '4Season' bikes [up to then only used on sleeping bags] and they sold amazingly well. After that the all season bike became more and more popular and now I think my ultimate expression of that is the Columbus steel Mason Resolution"

WIRED MAGAZINE: Gear Of The Year.

road.cc: Conversation Mason.

Dom from Mason Cycles talks about his new alloy and Ti Bokeh framesets, and more: Most of these features and decisions he makes are the ones that most won’t see or even bother about, but they’re the ones that make all the difference between normal and special, the little detail that you might spot once you’ve owned a Mason for a month or two and it gives you a little smile.

“...It’s much much harder, but now I know the people that make the frames, I met them earlier and they gave me a hug, I get my hands dirty in their factory and we talk about things, and they try quite hard to get things right for me."

APERTURE2

We are 'Mason Progressive Cycles’ so we have developed the V2 version of our award winning Aperture fork. The V2 Aperture is completely new tooling and features Ø12mm Thru-axle, flat-mount, a little more tyre clearance as bigger tyres are becoming very popular, sealed internal routing, and of course all the mudguard mounts and fittings of the V1. The fork also features our unique Mason 'F-Stop' axle system, with Mason developed axle and replaceable fork inserts.

We've just finished ride testing the new fork and it really is excellent, it'll certainly be worth the wait.

DEVELOPMENT OF BOKEH

“…to us, ‘AdventureSport’ is when you’re out there underneath a mountain, riding fast. We’re not talking about gravel. The word ‘gravel’ sounds dull to me. AdventureSport is about doing it fast. That’s what our original Mason bikes do well, and that’s what we’re continuing here with BOKEH”. Dom Mason | Mason Cycles owner/designer.

The new ‘Bokeh’ [Alu] and ‘BokehTi’ frame sets and bikes have been in development for over a year, they are AdventureSport bikes for fast ‘Continent Crushing’ rides and they can use either 650b x 50mm or 700c x 41mm tyres. These new bikes are big news for us because they are the bikes to follow up our first ever models the Award Winning Definition and Resolution.

The first painted Bokeh frames are here, they will be available in Element Grey [see pic.] and Flare Orange. We aim to have Bokeh and BokehTi framesets and bikes available on the site by the end of September.

Pre-orders for the first small batch are available now. Please contact us below for more information and to secure your Bokeh or Bokeh Ti.

PRESS & CUSTOMER REVIEWS

Without doubt, the most valuable information for us is the feedback that we get from the very customers who ride our bikes and make up the growing community. We've been trying our best to make this as visible as possible through our 'MASONbuilt' gallery and 'MASONcite' blog posts, but for us this wasn't enough.

So, we now have AN ENTIRE SECTION of our website developed to clearly display the MASONbuilt/cite archives. This will be kept fully up to date with your latest comments.

This new section also includes access to the full archive of press literature & awards that the Resolution and Definition bikes have accumulated.

THANK YOU! to everyone for your comments, reviews, and for staying in touch.

MASONbuilt | Flyweight.

As comfortable as it is just cruising along, you end up attacking climbs and sprinting for signs just because it's so much fun. I'm not altogether sure what I expected, but what I got was one of the most enjoyable bikes I've ever ridden.

MASONmedia

CYCLING WEEKLY: 9/10 RESOLUTION REVIEW.

'The finish is impeccable...Mason has even considered where to place the logos, so that they are not visible from the front, but can be seen from the rear and side of the frame.'

'Half way through a summer ride through the Chiltern Hills I decided to extend my route, so enjoyable was my time on the Resolution... It’s a bike which is really fun to ride, with a stable geometry and longish wheelbase, but without feeling at all sluggish and unresponsive....'

MASONcite: THE RIGHT BIKE FOR THE JOB.

" It's what I bought the bike for. There aren't many bikes out there that I would be as happy riding the gravel roads through the forests and along the rivers then heading out for some big climbs around the Verdon/Nice/Liguria. It's an amazing achievement to get so much into one bike. It felt like I was always on the right bike for the job whatever the job may be.

RCUK: 9 OF THE BEST STEEL BIKES FOR 2016

'Mason is committed to the idea of the four-seasons bike – a jack of all trades if you will – and the Resolution fits the billing perfectly.'

'...there’s a performance edge to the Resolution, too, and the frame is made from Columbus Spirit and Life tubing, with a wide, ovalised toptube and oversized downtube to boost stiffness, as well as a tapered headtube.'

THE GUARDIAN: ADVENTURE BIKES

The Guardian recently featured an 'Adventure Bike' article and we qualified for inclusion due to the ability of our bikes to take long distances and varied road surface and terrain in their stride. Oh and of course the ability to carry a rider to the winning spot in one of the most epic of cycling adventures, The Transcontinental Race.

"Mason has integrated many of the features of modern carbon bikes, such as internal cable routing and a large D-section downtube, into a frame made from top-of-the line Columbus steel."

MASON FORMAT KIT AND CLOTHING: SPRING OFFER

Spring is here and we are celebrating by giving you 20% off every full kit order [as modelled here by TCR 2015 Winner Josh Ibbett] before 31st May, and FREE SHIPPING on all all items of clothing to UK destinations.

PRE-ORDERS: UPDATE2.

The latest and greatest news is that our next batch of forks are in Italy and being painted now and we hope to have them in the UK and available for your framesets and bike builds by the end of May.

Our framesets and bikes are marked as 'Pre-order' at the moment, frame stock is good but we were a little behind with fork manufacture, we can now get back up to speed.

We are very different from many small bike brands and one major difference is that we don't settle for 'off the shelf' components if they don't suit our ideals. Because of this we designed and tooled up for our very own fork, the Mason 'Aperture'. Our unique fork has allowed us to design bikes with superb award winning ride qualities and our success has meant that demand has outstripped fork supply and we have been playing catchup!

Thanks to all of you who have pre-ordered, we will be emailing you all personally with details and will keep you updated.

road.cc: WINNER 'Frameset Of The Year'

"This was a very strong category and picking a winner was no easy task."

And so to the winner of the frameset of the year award, and it’s the Resolution, the steel frame version of Mason’s Definition earlier in this list. There’s little to match the sublime ride quality of a really good steel frame, and the Resolution is a really good steel frame.

Why it wins: Classic steel ride quality with modern details including disc brakes and space for wide tyres.

The Times Review:

"A triumph in cycle manufacturing"

It would be a very special machine indeed that could persuade the cycling devotee to stop his endless quest for “just one more bike,” but when it comes to a Mason you might instead find yourself looking to get in just one more ride instead.

A triumph in cycle manufacturing.

Summary: It would be difficult to find a better year round bike. Reassuringly stable even in extreme weather, with plenty of oomph should you need it and jaw dropping good looks

BikesETC: THE WORLD'S SEXIEST BIKES.

CYCLIST: RESOLUTION REVIEW.

"FINESSE

A huge amount of thought has gone into the Mason Resolution. Mudguard and pannier bosses (top and bottom of seatstay) are as neat as can be, leaving the Resolution’s lines resolutely ‘racy’. A chain-hanging tab is a blessed old-school touch to stop the chain dragging on the chainstays when the rear wheel is removed.

CYCLING WEEKLY Aug. 20th: 9/10 Review for Mason Resolution.

"Slick Stylish and addictively rideable"
"Mason has produced an on-trend endurance road bike with a quality feel, clever design and retro-appeal. Thanks to the disc brakes, internal cable routing, wide tyres and mudguard clearance, you could ride this bike through the worst a UK winter has to offer, making for a truly versatile machine."

Transcontinental Race 2015: Josh Ibbett wins!

Riding his race prepared Definition Ultegra Hydro/Di2 and covering an incredible 4239km at a moving average of 25.9kph in 9 Days / 23 Hours / 54 Minutes, Josh won the Transcontinental while the rest of the racers were in another country!

road.cc: Resolution Review

“Phenomenal steel ride from a bike that is fabulously put together and which brings the material bang up to date.”

"Owning a bike like this is a real experience rather than just something materialistic, the Resolution has a soul, it's more than just a form of transport or a tool for fitness it's something special."

"A truly amazing piece of engineering from the initial frame building right the way through to the overall finish."

road.cc: Definition Review

"The attention to detail, the finish, the welding - there isn't a fault to be found anywhere on the frame or fork."

“The ride is amazing, pure and simple. The tubes, the geometry, the finishing kit all come together to create a package that is hard to fault. The way it seems to come alive as you put more and more effort into becomes like a drug to the point where I was rarely taking it steady anymore. I needed that hit.”

Red Bull: How to start your own bike company

“As we sheltered from the cold in a cafe near Brighton’s famous seafront, it became impossible to ignore how impressive Dom’s achievement is. Both of his bikes, the Definition and the Resolution, offer a level of detail and finish that entire multi-national R&D departments might miss or neglect.”